Nine-Lives Syndrome
by RadioShack84
Summary: Magnum's clients and acquaintances expect him to be invincible, and he does his best to oblige, but once in a while life catches up with him. A whumpy extended ending to 1x07 "The Cat Who Cried Wolf" wrapped in a sick fic.


Disclaimer: I don't own Magnum, P.I. Written for enjoyment, not money.

* * *

When my phone rang at zero dark thirty, I had the not-so-irrational urge to throw it across the room. One squinty glance at the screen confirmed that it was my client, Al Charleston: high-rolling businessman, entrepreneur, and fair-weather philanthropist. I say fair-weather because from what I've seen he's more of a quid-pro-quo benefactor than someone helping others out of the goodness of his heart. Despite that, I'm a bit hard up for cash at the moment and the paycheck was too good to turn down. All I have to do is find Al's priceless Egyptian urn (that also happens to contain the ashes of his beloved grandmother) and then I'll be a little less in debt and he'll follow through with the donation he promised to Rick's favorite veterans' aid organization (the donation I accidentally discovered he'd planned to renege on during the first day of my investigation).

Reluctantly, I answered the phone.

"Thomas, it's Alistair."

Yep, he even has a high-roller name, rather than one that you'd typically hear shortened to Al, like Albert or Alan.

"Morgan's the one who stole it, Thomas! What you said this afternoon about his bank records got me thinking, and I followed him tonight. He has the urn, and unfortunately you were right about there being more to his auctioneering business, but I think his lowlife little brother may have put him up to it."

Sherm Morgan is Al's business partner and acquisitions expert, and from the information I've uncovered so far, including a large foreign bank account, Sherm's side-business appears to also be a front for sales of everything from illegally-obtained artifacts to drugs and guns. There was just one thing…

"Wait, Morgan has a brother?" I knew about a cousin with ties to a local drug gang, but there weren't any siblings in his history.

"Yes, of course, I'm sure I've mentioned Robert before," Al said impatiently. "Listen, never mind that. I'm going to need your help to get the urn away from Morgan. How soon can you meet me at this address?"

I looked at my phone as a text popped up, and groaned inwardly. The place he wanted to meet was in a remote area of the island, far from backup and slow to access at the best of times, and a glance out the window confirmed that these were not the best of times. It was raining, hard, and the forecast called for much of the same until midday tomorrow. "Give me 45 minutes," I said.

Charleston cleared his throat nervously and lowered his voice. "Allow me to rephrase that, Thomas. Get your ass over here, now. I'm sorry, but as you're aware, Morgan's colleagues are armed. There's also blood on their clothes, a _lot_ of it, and I think Robert saw me. When he finds out from Morgan that I'm not supposed to be here, I won't be able to stall for long."

I heard a loud clap of thunder and shouting in the background just before the call ended, and wondered not for the first time since meeting Charleston what I'd gotten myself into. He may have had good financial instincts but his instincts about people were another story, and it was amazing to me that he'd made it as far as he had before falling in with someone like Morgan. If I didn't get to him soon, though, he was going to get himself killed.

I swung my legs out of bed and let out the groan that I'd kept to myself on the phone. My entire body ached (courtesy of the roughing-up I'd received from Morgan's friends the day before when they'd caught me snooping on his laptop), and I shivered violently in my warm bedroom (courtesy of the flu virus I was now eighteen hours into fighting).

In case you're wondering, private investigators don't get sick days, mostly because there's no one to pick up the slack. Unless I want to call in HPD to take over my investigation, endure an ass-chewing from Detective Katsumoto when the inevitable dead body turns up, and lose my fee in the process, I'm on my own.

To make matters worse, people who are just getting to know me always tend to think that I have nine lives or something, so they don't cut me any slack. I call the phenomenon Nine-Lives Syndrome, and Al definitely has it. He's the one who found me half-conscious on the floor after he interrupted the altercation at his office, I bled on his leather upholstery on the way to the ER, he insisted on driving me home after they reduced my dislocated shoulder and diagnosed the cause of my fever, and yet here he is, making demands not six hours later as though I should be completely healed.

Now I know what you're thinking, I must be exaggerating, right? Al's a rich guy who only cares about his own interests, but this sort of thing can't possibly happen all that often? Well, you'd be wrong. Remember Cecilia's lost cat, Mittens? That case is a perfect example. Higgins and Katsumoto weren't much more than professional acquaintances of mine at that point, and their faith in my Mittens-esque ability to bounce back from anything nearly killed me.

Think I'm exaggerating again? I have one word for you: anaphylaxis. It didn't start out that way, but it never does.

Those allergy pills Higgins gave me when we were still tailing Max the cat actually worked wonders, but then I went and got hit by a car and things spiraled downward from there. Ten hours, a murder investigation, a kidnapping, a swim, and an explosion later, and I was sitting in a rubber life-raft with said murderer/kidnapper, ready to pass out from pain and exhaustion. (Three broken ribs _do_ actually hurt, contrary to what Higgy would have you believe.) It wasn't like I could just fall asleep next to someone who wanted me dead, either, so I ended up awake for the second night in a row, making sure Nadella didn't try to finish what he'd started. Fortunately, he didn't.

Also fortunate is that Nine-Lives Syndrome only applies to my new acquaintances. Those familiar with me, like my buddy Rick, realize I'm not quite invincible. He probably knew I wasn't all right the minute I told him I was, and had Nadella not been suffering from a gunshot wound when Rick climbed aboard our raft, that would have been that. He'd have patched me up and made sure I got checked out as soon as the Coast Guard picked us up.

Instead, he applied a couple of butterfly strips to my bleeding eyebrow, then went to work on Nadella while I snuck a pain pill from his first aid kit. The Coast Guard cutter arrived a few minutes later, saving us from being stranded in the ocean but prolonging my already-endless day. Nadella still had a bullet in his leg, so Rick had to help him out of the raft, leaving me to trail unsteadily behind them. My ribs stabbed with every step and my vision was blurring as the narcotic began to hit my bloodstream, so I was a little bit jealous when the cutter's Health Services Technician showed up with only one gurney. Nadella was quickly wheeled away in luxury, and all I could think to do was follow the sound of Rick's voice as we navigated narrow corridors and he answered the medic's questions about my kidnapper's condition.

"Sir, are you all right?"

I blinked heavily and looked up when I realized that we'd stopped moving and that Flores, the HS, was addressing me. We were standing in the doorway of the boat's small sickbay, and Flores was giving me a concerned once-over. So was Rick.

"You don't look so good, buddy."

The medic nodded in agreement. "You're awfully pale, sir. Why don't you have a seat? I'll be with you in a few minutes, but you can rest here until then," he said, indicating the cot that wasn't occupied by Nadella.

That sounded like a great idea, as I was beginning to suspect that my blurred vision had a lot more to do with the several hours I'd just spent bouncing around the ocean on a raft than the pain pill I'd ingested, but I'd no sooner taken a step forward than Katsumoto stuck his head out of the room across the way. "Magnum, glad you're back. I've got the FBI and HPD on a conference call. They need your statement."

Flores objected before I could think to (I like that guy), but his opinion that I needed treatment for dehydration didn't trump the fact that I still had at least seven lives left by Katsumoto's estimation, and I found myself being literally pulled into the debriefing as the detective assured Flores and Rick that it would only take a minute.

An hour and change later I followed Katsumoto out of the conference room in a daze, the call having been cut short only by virtue of the Coast Guard anticipating a busy day ahead and wanting us off their boat. I still have no recollection of how I ended up in the passenger seat of Katsumoto's borrowed SUV, or how the Ferrari came to be parked at HPD Headquarters. In any case, I was out cold when the former delivered me to the latter. Katsumoto actually looked somewhat apologetic when he nudged me awake, handed me my third bottle of water since the Coast Guard conference room, and asked if I was okay to drive myself home.

I answered yes automatically and was relieved to find that it was true when I got behind the wheel. While I was by no means well-rested, the pain medication was finally working, and the small amount of sleep had at least helped my vision return to normal. I stopped on a deserted roadside to change into the t-shirt and shorts I kept in the boot in case of emergency, and felt human enough that I decided to swing by Cecilia's to concede failure and offer my apologies for not having found Mittens. I figured I'd sleep better with the last of the unpleasantries out of the way.

To my surprise, the cat had returned in my absence and I actually got paid in full. Just when I thought the day was looking up, though, I ran into more trouble of the four-legged kind back home. The Hellhounds lunged at me from out of nowhere as I was trudging across Robin's infinite lawn, and I almost tripped over my own feet in my effort to avoid them. Without that adrenaline rush, though, I doubt I'd have had the energy left to spar with Higgins over whom I had to thank for still having six of my nine lives.

I can't figure her out. One minute she was giving me the third degree for being ungrateful and the next she was replacing my ruined department store shirt with a very expensive Aloha shirt that she somehow knew would fit my taste despite (or maybe because of) its garish appearance.

Holding up the replacement in front of the mirror, I smiled at the look and the puzzle that was Higgy, then winced as one of my ribs reminded me of my big plan to sleep for days. I made a brief detour to the kitchen for more water, and decided on the way back that the couch would be plenty comfortable for the first day, since it happened to be fifteen steps closer than the bed. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Before we get into that, though, you may be wondering where Rick ended up in all of this and why, as someone _not_ suffering from Nine-Lives Syndrome, he didn't rescue me from Katsumoto's debriefing. Simple: Rick likes to talk. Yeah, I realize that's old news, but get him around someone who knows anything about the beach club industry and he'll literally go on for hours. He started chatting with one of the Coast Guard officers about the resort she and her husband owned in the Caymans and followed her ashore like the Pied Piper while the cutter's CO was still busy trying to shoo Katsumoto out of the briefing room. Rick waited for us at the dock while he continued his conversation, but was so distracted by the riveting topic of beach umbrellas (or something) that Katsumoto and I unknowingly slipped past him.

He eventually came to his senses and realized we were gone, and when his text to me went unanswered (what with my phone being at the bottom of the Pacific), his mother-hen instincts led him to Robin's. I'm told the conversation went something like this:

"Juliet, where's Thomas?"

"Despite the fact that he most certainly needs one, I'm not his keeper. Have you tried the guest house?"

"No, the Ferrari's out front so I thought he was here."

"Obviously not. He said something about sleeping."

"Damn, I knew it was bad."

"Why is sleeping bad?"

"He stole a pain pill from TC's first aid kit earlier. He thought I didn't notice."

"I…still don't follow."

"Thomas doesn't even take ibuprofen when he's sick, and this was the hydrocodone TC keeps in the kit for emergencies!"

"Well, I imagine his ribs are still a bit sore from when he got hit yesterday."

"Hit? By Nadella?"

"No, by a car, while we were chasing him."

"What?! Why didn't you say something?"

"My apologies. I momentarily mistook Magnum for an adult capable of communicating his misadventures to his friends on his own."

"You'll find that Thomas can be very...selective...when communicating certain details."

"Hmm. I'll keep that in mind."

"Good. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go yell at him."

"By all means, but he was in a rather foul mood. Don't say I didn't warn you if he reacts badly to being woken up."

In my defense, it's difficult to communicate your misadventures when you've been kidnapped, I was in a bad mood because I'd nearly been ripped to shreds by both the dogs _and_ their owner, and it was more that I was reacting badly to having _gone to sleep_ on the couch that I'd forgotten Max had roamed all over the day before.

The sneezing is what ultimately woke me, although the patches of red covering my torso were hard to ignore. I sat up slowly and grabbed a Kleenex, wondering where I'd left the box of antihistamines, but I didn't have the energy to go look for it. My body suddenly felt like it was made of concrete. Heavy, dizzy, itchy, nauseous concrete. I even thought I might have been hallucinating when I first saw Rick standing in the doorway.

"You know when I said you didn't look good earlier? Well, you look way worse now."

"Gee, thanks," I said, pinching the bridge of my nose in an attempt to ward off another sneeze. It didn't work.

Rick frowned and sat down across from me on the coffee table. "Not kidding, TM. I can't believe you didn't tell me you got hit by a car yesterday. Are you all right? Tell me the truth this time."

I sighed. "I'm fine, Rick, I promise. Just sore." I waved a hand at the rash that seemed to be spreading. "This isn't helping, though."

"What did you do, run into a catfish in the ocean?"

If looks could kill, Rick would have been a goner. "Hilarious, but no. I think it's from Max being in here yesterday. I need more allergy pills."

"If you're reacting like that, first you need to get away from Max, which probably means getting away from everything in this room. Come on, I'm sure Higgy won't mind if you crash on her couch for a couple of hours."

I had to laugh. "Have you _met_ Higgins? She'll mind."

"Your other option is the ER," Rick said seriously, and I wondered how terrible I really looked and if he could somehow sense my churning stomach. Reluctantly, I let him pull me to my feet and help me to the main house, where I snagged a wastebasket on my way to the living room, just to be safe. Much to my horror, I'd barely sat down before I needed it, and Higgins returned from her game while I was still doubled over.

"Rick, I already told you that Magnum's not...here," she trailed off, apparently noticing that I _was_, in fact. "What happened?" her voice took on a hint of concern.

"Thomas is apparently _very_ allergic to cats. I found him like this in the guest house...well, not quite like _this_," Rick amended quietly and resumed rubbing circles on my back as I started heaving again. "Do you know where his allergy medication is? I figured I'd look for it after I got him away from the cat hair."

Higgins didn't immediately answer, and a moment later I felt her warm fingers curl around my wrist. "His pulse is racing. This is far past antihistamine territory, Rick. Dammit, I was only joking about anaphylaxis earlier. It almost never happens with pet allergies."

I could hear the regret in her voice and wanted to tell her there was no way she could have known, but I didn't have the air. I was suddenly wheezing, which didn't help the anxiety that was building inside me, and I jumped when Rick squeezed my shoulder and asked me if I could sit up. I shook my head no, but it apparently wasn't a request, and he pulled me away from the wastebasket and leaned me back against the couch, which did help my breathing a little. I blinked watery eyes, trying to focus on the spinning room. "Where'd Higgins go?" I asked breathlessly.

"Right here, Magnum." She hurried back in from the direction of the kitchen, carrying a small black case.

"What's that?"

"EpiPen. Luckily for you, Mr. Masters' housekeeper suffers from an allergy to bee stings and he always keeps a few of these on hand."

She held it up to show me and I _freaked out_. It didn't look like an EpiPen to my blurred vision so much as a torture device straight out of my nightmares. I was instantly struggling to escape as Afghanistan tried to resurrect itself right there in Robin Masters' living room. Rick attempted to talk me down, but I was beyond hearing, so he did the only other thing he could: he grabbed me in a bear hug and held on. I felt a sharp pain in the side of my thigh, and my eyes shot wide open as I was overtaken by the biggest adrenaline rush I'd ever had. It _hurt_. It also gave me an intense head rush that worsened the vertigo, so where Rick had been restraining me a moment before, he was suddenly holding me up.

"C-crap," I stuttered into his shoulder, my whole body trembling helplessly.

"Hang in there, Tommy Boy, you're safe. Just breathe. You're going to be fine," Rick murmured. He relaxed his grip a little to ease the pressure on my ribs, but didn't let go of me until the tremors and ragged wheezing began to ease up. Even then he hovered, as I sank bonelessly into the couch and closed my eyes against the throbbing headache the epinephrine had left behind.

I stayed that way until the doorbell rang, at which point I cringed almost involuntarily. "Paramedics?" I asked.

The look of dread on my face must have been extreme, because Rick snorted. "Relax, would you? I had Higgins call Noelani. She owes me a favor."

I really didn't want to know why a medical examiner owed my friend a favor, but I decided that I owed him one too. Still steeping in stirred-up memories, I wasn't sure I could have handled being stuck in the hospital just then, and I was beyond grateful that Rick had noticed, even if that meant that I still had to answer what felt like a hundred questions from Dr. Cunha. She was efficient, though, and had me tucked away in the guest bedroom, showered clean of all cat residue, with my ribs re-wrapped in less than an hour. It wasn't a moment too soon, either. Even epinephrine had its limits, and once it was gone, I was too. I fell asleep mid-vitals-check and was out for the next sixteen hours. Rick claims that Noelani woke me a few times to make sure I wasn't developing a second reaction, but I'll have to take his word for that, or maybe get Higgy to hack into his phone, because he also claims to have blackmail-quality photographic evidence of one such incident.

Anyway, to make a long story still long, that gives you an idea of the adverse effects Nine-Lives Syndrome can have on my health. Last time it was kidnapping and anaphylaxis. This time, if Morgan's men don't get me then the flu and the injuries they've already inflicted just might.

It's true that the pain from a dislocation decreases dramatically after everything's back where it should be, but by the time I pulled on a pair of shorts and maneuvered my arm into the sleeve of a button-down, my shoulder was on fire all over again and the rest of me wasn't much better off. The chills had gone, leaving me sweating as I unlocked my weapon from the safe and awkwardly tucked it into my waistband with my left hand before making my way to the kitchen.

Caffeine was my only hope of not falling asleep at the wheel on my way to meet Charleston, so I set the coffee to brew and slumped on a barstool to wait. Having hardly opened my eyes along the way, I failed to notice the intruder in the living room. Sometimes a barely-audible scuff on the tile is the only warning you get in my line of work, though. I stood up quickly in surprise, spun around, and made an instinctive grab for my gun before realizing how bad all of those ideas were. My right arm dropped uselessly to my side without coming anywhere near the gun (partially because I'd put it on the counter when I sat down) and I grunted in pain as the dark figure lunged at me.

The impact, when it came, wasn't from a bullet or a knife penetrating my chest. It was from the other person throwing their weight against mine to keep me from hitting the floor as I pitched forward. My head was swimming and it took me several seconds to lock my knees enough to stay somewhat upright as I was shuffled and shoved into a chair.

"Magnum, can you hear me?"

"H'gns?"

"Magnum, open your eyes."

She turned my face toward her and I unconsciously leaned into the cool touch as I struggled to follow her instruction. "What're you doing here?" I mumbled. "It's the middle of the night."

"I drew the short straw," she said wryly, shifting her hand to my forehead. "God, Thomas, you're burning up. Did you take the meds TC left out for you earlier?"

"I don't know." Since when was thinking so difficult?

"Always for you, I'd imagine."

I blinked at her in wonder. "You never mentioned you were telepathic, Higgy."

She sighed and withdrew her hand. "I'm not, but you're bordering on delirious. You were speaking aloud just now."

"Oh."

"What are you even doing up?"

"Making coffee."

"Is that something you normally do at three a.m. whilst armed?"

That got my eyes fully open. "Damn, I'm late. Morgan has the urn and Charleston needs backup."

Higgins frowned. "You'll do him no good in your condition, Magnum, nor should you. A few hours ago that prat left you in his car in the driveway, _half-sedated_, while he called another car to pick him up for a fundraising function. It took both TC and I to get you inside."

"I'll admit that Al's not my favorite person at the moment, Higgy, but I still have a job to do and he's in danger."

"And you're so ill you nearly passed out a moment ago. I don't particularly care _what_ happens to Mr. Charleston or his prized urn at this point, even if I end up having to pay to tow his bloody car away myself."

"But-"

"_But_ I know you do care, which is why I agreed to stay here this evening while Rick and TC shadowed your client. They called in Detective Katsumoto when Morgan's associates showed up looking rougher than usual and he should be arriving there with backup as we speak, so relax. You have the night off."

I let out a resigned sigh.

"You don't seem pleased."

"Al was fairly adamant that I not bring HPD in on this, which supports my developing theory that he knows more about Morgan's activities than he let on. I was just hoping to get his urn back before I found any proof that obligated me to turn him in," I told her with a half-smile.

"Well, then, you're in luck. Given the circumstances, Katsumoto has promised to make sure that both you and Rick get paid before he charges Mr. Charleston with any criminal activity he may be involved in. I'm to impress upon you, however, that this is a one-time favor as a thank-you for helping him locate Stanley Tak's killer a few weeks ago, and that he does not work for you in any capacity."

My smile expanded into a grin. Higgins was angry on my behalf over the way my client was treating me and Katsumoto was doing me favors because I was sick - this was uncharted territory! Nine-Lives Syndrome wasn't a chronic condition for most, but I'd never actually witnessed anyone recover from it until now, let alone two people in the same night. There was just one thing I was curious about, "How do you and Katsumoto know about the donation Al owes Rick?"

Higgins rolled her eyes. "Please, Magnum. Even with your desperately modest client list, you wouldn't have continued to work for someone as obnoxious as Charleston without a better reason than a sizable paycheck. It didn't take much to make the connection."

"Thanks...I think."

"Also, I happened to be on the line when Rick was explaining the situation to the detective."

I huffed out a laugh that quickly turned into a large yawn.

"It's late, you should rest. Do you think you can make it back to your room?"

"Not sure," I admitted. I was still dizzy if I moved much, and the pull of sleep was irresistible now that I didn't have to go to work. I must have dozed off in that moment, because the next thing I knew there was an odd beeping sound and Higgins was handing me a glass of water and twenty pills.

"Three, not twenty. Don't be so dramatic."

"Are you sure you're not telepathic?"

"Yes, although it's a common misconception held by those with 103-degree fevers."

The beeping in my ear and the Tylenol on my palm suddenly made a lot more sense and I swallowed the tablets, then let Higgins take the glass from my shaking hands before it could spill.

"Here, get settled. I'll fetch you a blanket."

The ottoman from across the room lightly bumped my shins, and while it was a great idea in theory, I was so weak that I only managed to get one leg halfway onto it before I gave in to gravity and decided I was never moving again.

"Magnum."

"Hmm?" I carefully shifted my focus from the slow spin-and-tilt of the ceiling to Higgins' slightly more stationary form, and found her looking at me with uncharacteristic sympathy.

"May I help?"

If she was being anything other than sincere I was too tired to notice, and I gave a small nod of permission before letting my eyes travel back to the ceiling. Her non-fevered hands were almost painful against my overheated skin, but she eased my legs up without aggravating my collection of bruises or aching muscles, and helped me to recline the chair, adjusting the cushions until I was lying nearly flat.

"Be right back," she murmured.

"'kay." Lulled by the distant rumble of thunder, my eyelids had descended below half-mast by the time I heard her footsteps returning, and they closed fully in relief when she placed a cool cloth on my forehead. The promised blanket followed a moment later, and I felt awareness slipping as she tucked it around me.

"Get some sleep, Thomas. I'm here if you need anything."

_Thanks, Juliet_, I thought, and then did my best to mumble it out loud just in case she was telling the truth about not being telepathic. A gentle pat on my good shoulder told me that my message had been received, if not by which means, and I soon drifted off to the sound of the pouring rain.


End file.
